The Tax Service Dismisses the Head of the Excise Division Amid Record Decline in Revenues

The State Tax Service conducted personnel purges in the excise block after a failure of October budget revenues.

According to Plinsky, acting head of the State Tax Service Yuriy Konushenko signed an order to dismiss the director of the Department for the Control of Excise Goods, Khrystyna Bozhenko, by mutual consent. The decision was coordinated with the Ministry of Finance of Ukraine. Also read: From 1 in January 2027 it will become harder to buy alcohol or cigarettes online. Along with her, as the journalist asserts, another official who worked in the risk management direction is leaving the department. Plinsky links the personnel changes to the shortfall in October excise receipts and to the government’s plans to intensify the fight against illegal turnover of excisable products, primarily tobacco products and spirits. According to the journalist, the government plans to intensify work to eradicate tax evasion schemes and to formalize markets. He also notes that relevant issues are discussed at regular meetings with the participation of the prime minister, security agencies, and members of parliament. The Tax Service dismisses the head of the excise direction amid record revenue decline (photo: t.me/plinskiymedia)

Excise revenues did not meet the plan. Recall that October 2026 was a failure for excise proceeds (underachievement of the monthly plan by 7,1 billion UAH or by 40%), and for VAT (underachievement of the monthly plan by 11,7 billion UAH or by 32%). For excise, the strongest underperformance was recorded in the tobacco market — 3,8 billion UAH, or 32,4%. “This is not a ‘technical deviation,’ but a diagnosis. Systematic work to formalize the economy should yield results primarily in VAT and excise, and it has failed here,” said Danilo Getmanets, head of the Verkhovna Rada committee on finance, tax, and customs policy. According to a Kantar Ukraine study, in July the share of illegal products in Ukraine’s cigarette market was 21,6% (in April this year — 19,8%), and the electronic vape market remains fully in the shadow. This is the worst indicator in the last two years. The expected annual losses to the state budget from the illegal cigarette market, according to Kantar Ukraine, amount to a record 36,4 billion UAH. In October, under the chairmanship of Prime Minister of Ukraine Serhiy Korenetskyi and Minister of Finance Serhiy Marchenko, a meeting of the Interagency Working Group on the shadow economy took place, where its composition was updated and key priorities were defined. In particular, the prime minister noted after the meeting that the government’s immediate measures include working on the taxation of electronic cigarettes and their liquids, combating smuggling, and eliminating tax evasion schemes. Earlier we reported that Ukraine proposes increasing penalties for illegal sale of liquids for electronic cigarettes to 250 thousand UAH to effectively combat the shadow market.